


A Guitar Pick, a Punk Band, and a Complete Cliché

by CarbMother



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Punk, F/M, No Demigods, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, Punk Percy, annabeth is like yes pls, percabeth, percy is in a punk band, thalia has been shipping this before they even met
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-05
Updated: 2017-04-05
Packaged: 2018-10-14 21:16:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10544464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CarbMother/pseuds/CarbMother
Summary: Annabeth was determined not to be part of a relationship. The Fates and her best friend Thalia disagree with her. So imagine her annoyance when Thalia just "happens" to introduce her to a very attractive guy with sea-green eyes that she just can't get out of her head.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So, I'm new to the archive, and I already had this on my fanfiction account. I'm working on another piece right now, but I'm excited to post this for my first fic here. 
> 
> AH

 

Happy endings aren’t realistic, love isn’t rational, and soulmates are only real in fiction. 

Sure, when you’re little and you read all of those fantastic stories with the prince and the princess you think, _that is going to be me one day_. And some days, it feels like that fairytale might come true, but then you discover that that cute barista who works in your favorite coffee shop isn’t into blondes and that he is also a major asshole. But in very, _very,_ rare occasions, the terms of a fairytale apply.

 

…….

 

It was a weird day, and I’m not gonna lie, it was a pretty shitty one. And since it _was_ a total shit day I decided, sure, why not go to the bar? Of course, I asked along my best friend, the very lovely Thalia Grace. 

We had known each other since high school and now that I think about it, our friendship was pretty cliché. Somewhat sporty girl hates punk girl and vice versa until they are forced to get to know each other and end up best friends. Like I said, incredibly cliché. 

Well, she’s been my best friend for years, and when I told her I was having a crap day and I wanted to just calm down and relax, she was all in.

“Thank the gods!” Thalia laughed at me through the phone. “I knew you were going to snap eventually!”

“What?”

“What, this _isn’t_ about your shoving yourself into work in hopes of smothering your sexual frustrations?” She snickered at me through the phone. The nerve! Sometimes it was very hard to remember why she was my best friend. 

“No! That is definitely not why, and I am not!” 

“Whatever helps you sleep at night.” I could practically see her smirking with all of that punk sass. 

“So,” I changed the topic, “I was thinking we could stop at that bar on 15th Street, maybe grab a few drinks?”

“Haha, no way,” she laughed, “not this time. This time, we are going out to one of my bars so you can actually live a little.”

“Thalia,” I argued, “we just aren’t into the same stuff, it would be really awkward.”

“Annie, I know you like to feel safe, but now is not the time. It isn’t natural for a 21 year old college student to be so…so… _tame_ on a Saturday night. You should be out and about; tearing up the town! I bet that you wouldn’t even be thinking about going to a bar tonight if it wasn’t for me. You know what else? You probably wouldn’t be cool enough to even go to the bar that I’m talking about anyways.” She attempted to sound innocent as she dangled her taunts in front of me. I knew it was a challenge and I didn’t really want to go to her punk bar, but Annabeth Chase does not back down from a challenge!

“Alright. Fine,” I sighed, “come over and help me pick out something to wear.” She squealed through the phone and I could almost feel the pure excitement she was emitting.

“I’ll be there in ten! And don’t you dare say anything about that squeal. Mention it to anyone and you are dead Chase. I don’t give a shit that you are my best friend. You will die.” I couldn’t help but laugh at her last statement. Oh gods, what had I gotten myself into? 

 

…….

 

True to her word, Thalia arrived exactly ten minutes later: ready to go and bouncing on her feet. One look at her and I couldn’t help rolling my eyes. As soon as I had opened the door wide enough, she rushed in, leaving me to clutch it so I didn’t fall over. 

“Is this really all you have in the way of clothing?” Her yelling came from my room. 

“I don’t criticize your clothing choices, so why should you be able to criticize mine?” I wandered into my room, immediately noticing the piles of my clothes that now littered the floor. Thalia was searching through all of my clothes, throwing anything she deemed unworthy onto the floor.

“I can’t believe it.” She turned to me with pity. “You have no good clothing; only all of this bright, colorful stuff! The only black things you own are shoes and a jacket! Ugh. I suppose that we’ll just have to go find something suitable before we go out.” 

“Thalia! No I can’t—“ She rushed over to me and placed her hand over my mouth to stop me from talking. I was already a college student, I was barely able to make rent and feed myself let alone buy clothes.

“Don’t worry about it okay?” Thalia grinned at me as a glared at her. “It’ll be my treat! Anyways, I have to find something to do with all the money dear old Daddy sent me in the mail.” I looked at her with an incredibly annoyed expression, but didn’t argue. I knew that she had a stressed relationship with her dad, and that with him just sending her checks in the mail she felt like he was trying to quiet her from ruining his reputation as a powerful and respected businessman. 

“Alrighty then!” She rushed out of my room when I nodded and rolled my eyes.“Let’s kick it. It’s time to go find you something rebellious to wear,” she exclaimed. 

“I can’t wait to see the lovely Miss Annabeth Chase in punk gear. This is going to be epic!”

 

…….

 

“Don’t you think this is a little bit much?” I cringed at the amount of black I was wearing as Thalia not-so-subtly grinned like a maniac.

“No,” she smiled deviously, “actually I think it might be a little too tame.” I looked back at her, ready to protest when she pulled out one of the matching cards that we had made back in high school. They could be used once every few months and the person it was used on couldn’t argue no matter what. 

“Fine,” I glared at her as she chuckled to herself, looking at me like she had something evil planned. “On one condition though. Just promise me that you won’t pick anything with spikes on it. I don’t feel like accidentally stabbing myself.” She pouted for a bit before sighing and agreeing to the compromise. 

“Alright, let’s go somewhere else to find you some good clothes.” Thalia grinned and left me in the dressing room.

 

…….

 

“Okay, so I’m going to take you to a very special place,” Thalia spoke to me like a two year old, “and when we get there, you are going to cover your eyes until I pick out all of your clothes and accessories.” She started dragging me across the mall.

“Really Thalia? Accessories?”

“Oh yeah Annie,” she laughed, “we’re going all in on this one.” 

I really should have known better when she was dragging me to the complete opposite side of the mall where I knew there was a Hot Topic. Honestly, I’m pretty surprised that she didn’t dye my hair that day too. 

“Alright Annie,” she covered my eyes, “close your eyes. You’re going in blind until I choose your perfect style.”

“You sound like a punk Aphrodite.” I closed my eyes obediently as she pushed me into the store.

“Why are you so obsessed with all of that Greek stuff? It’s so boring.” I could practically hear her shaking her head. “And how is that even an insult? Isn’t she supposed to be hot or something?”

“Nevermind,” I rolled my eyes behind my hands and waited as she walked me forward. My suspicions were confirmed immediately. There was no mistaking it; the sounds of My Chemical Romance blaring through the speakers, the light that left my eyelids dark as soon as we entered, I was most definitely in a Hot Topic. 

“Annie, I’m going to leave you right here in this lovely corner, and you will stay there until I find your stuff okay? I’ll be right back.” 

“Oh! I almost forgot, don’t you dare open your eyes.” I nodded and and stayed in my corner with my eyes closed. She seemed satisfied as I heard her boots stomp away. 

“Is there any specific reason you have you eyes closed?” I snapped my eyes open at the unfamiliar voice. In front of me there was a pair of bright green eyes that were extremely close to my face. Bright green eyes that were attached to a very lovely face with messy black hair that looked very soft. 

“Maybe I’ll tell you if you move back a few inches,” I raised my eyebrow at him. I wasn’t sure, but when he quickly moved away, I’m pretty sure I saw a slight blush grace his cheeks. He was kinda cute to be honest, and that was saying something, because I didn’t really go for guys like him at all. 

He looked to me expectantly after replacing the cocky grin that I had a feeling was his default facial expression. I crossed my arms and smirked, pretending (okay, not really pretending but that doesn’t matter) to rake my eyes up and down his form. He definitely squirmed noticing that I had been looking at him and my inner teenage girl jumped up and down with glee. Reaching his arm up to scratch the back of his head, the light caught his cheeks and it became apparent that he was most definitely blushing. I grinned, about to say something sarcastic when low and behold, my incredibly wonderful best friend decided to show up.

“So I found the stuff that you should wear- Hey! Why are your eyes open? _Percy?_ ” We both looked to her with confusion before glancing at each other again.  
“Thalia,” I questioned, “you know this guy?” I looked towards him and he blushed again. (It was really hard not to grin at his cuteness but I bit it back.)

“Yeah,” she looked between us, “he’s my cousin. Meet Perseus. Perseus, meet Annabeth.”

“Hey,” he looked to her sharply, “don’t call me that!” I laughed a bit behind my hand and he turned to me attempting to look angry. It faded quickly into a grin once he saw me try to sober up and fail miserably.

“Well,” Thalia coughed, “if you guys are done flirting, Annabeth needs to try on some proper clothing.” We quickly looked away from each other blushing. I felt like I was in high school again. _What the hell was wrong with me?_

“Okay,” he sighed, “I’ll just get out of your hair then.” He turned to leave, waving a bit to us. 

“See you later!” Thalia called after him. He nodded, grinning bashfully when he caught my eyes. She turned to me and smirked.

“What?” I looked at her defensively.

“Nothing, nothing.” She grinned at me before shoving the clothes in my hands and herding me towards the dressing room. 

 

…….

 

“Remind me again why I decided this was a good idea?” I yelled over the music in an attempt to speak to Thalia. All she did in response was to grin at me mischievously. As the song ended, everyone quieted down and headed to the bar to grab a drink before the next band showed up. Grabbing my hand, Thalia dragged me to a table near the front of the stage. 

“So,” she smiled, “are you having fun so far?” 

“It’s not bad,” I admitted, “the only real problem I have is wearing all this black and the weird looks I keep getting from people. I mean it’s not terrible, but I don’t even know the band that is on this t-shirt.” She laughed at me and shook her head.

“Oh Annie,” she smiled, “you are totally having a ton of fun and you know it. Plus, if you want to stop getting all of those weird looks maybe you should let your hair down from that ridiculous bun thing. You look like a library rat!”

“Hey!” I argued. “I like libraries, they’re—” She looked at me with her eyebrow raised. “Oh, fine, I’ll pull it down, but I need somewhere to put the bobby pins.” She pointed to the table in front of us and grinned. I shook my head in exasperation, but started pulling them out anyway.

I was so absorbed with getting the things out of my hair that I barely noticed that the next band had come up on stage. Before I knew it, Thalia had grabbed my hand and pulled me to the front of the crowd. 

“Come on Annie! Let loose for once!” She spun me around, pulling my hair tie out. “Alright now,” she urged me grinning, “you are going to flip those gorgeous, golden curls!” I rolled my eyes before shaking them out and flipping my head back. I looked to her and she smiled with her thumbs up in approval. 

“Hey,” I called out to her, “this band isn’t half bad!” She looked at me and laughed before turning my head towards the stage. I almost didn’t recognize him until Thalia called out a wolf whistle towards the guitarist on stage. I gasped as he turned towards us in confusion, not seeing me until Thalia dragged me up to the very front, right next to her. He saw me and immediately grinned, winking like a complete dork. I swear, there were at least ten girls that screamed behind me.

“So,” I looked at Thalia, “your cousin is pretty famous in certain circles, huh?” She nodded, and looked back at the girls with a look of distaste. 

“Yeah,” she grimaced, “I guess he is. It’s a little bit weird after knowing him for so long and then seeing all of these girls freak out over him. I still see him as the little scrawny teenager who couldn’t even look at girls, much less talk to them without blushing.” I couldn’t help but laugh at that and Percy must have heard me because his head turned towards us and he grinned like a dork. 

“Shit,” she laughed, “he only just met you.”

“What?” I looked at her in confusion, my eyebrows scrunched together.

“I have never seen him act so cheesy in front of a girl before,” she yelled, “you must be special. I mean I was going to set you guys up anyway, but I didn’t think it would be this easy!” It took me a little bit of time to understand what she had said at first, but when I did I felt my face heat up. She laughed at me when I looked back up at the stage in an attempt to ignore her. 

“You totally like him too!” She laughed gleefully. “This is awesome!” I couldn’t help but look at him then and when he caught my eye, I must have blushed down to the roots because Thalia was laughing her ass off. 

The song blended into another, and before I knew it, Percy’s band was clearing off the stage and Thalia was dragging me through the sea of people towards the back of the building. 

“Where are we going?” I yelled over all of the noise coming from the people around us. I wasn’t sure if she heard me, because all she did was pull me forward faster. I had a mind to make her stop and tell me where we were going and why she was smiling so much, but she pulled me through a door before I could complain. 

“No arguing, no complaining, no worrying, and no running away. Okay?” She looked me straight in the eyes with one of the rare serious looks that she had.

“Fine,” I rolled my eyes, “just nothing too illegal.” 

“Annie,” she clutched her chest, “you wound me! You know that I would never do anything that could taint your innocence.”

“I’m only a year younger than you,” I frowned at her as she tried to keep her laughter in. 

“Alright,” she took a deep breath, “it’s time to stop dawdling. We need to catch them before they go.” And with that, she grasped my arm and dragged me unceremoniously down a flight of stairs and into the alleyway behind the bar. 

“Percy!” She waved at him while towing me behind her. He turned and grinned at us and my heart fluttered. _What the hell Annabeth? You literally just met him today, calm down._ I tried to pull myself together before we reached his van and just barely covered up my emotions.

If Thalia tripped me a little bit on “accident”then I was going to have to get angry at her later, because before I knew it I was falling towards the ground, and coincidentally, right towards Percy. And low and behold, right before I was about to hit the ground in that alley, I felt a warm pair of arms incircle my waist and pull me up to the chest attached to them. 

I think that my downfall in that moment was when I looked up. Here I was, pressed to the chest of a guy I barely knew, and I wasn’t doing a thing about it. And let me tell you, there are many things you can learn about a person from being clutched to their chest. One, Percy was definitely not lacking in the muscle department. Two, even though he had been standing on a stage under hot lights in all black for at least an hour he didn’t smell disgusting. His smell was intoxicating, like the ocean on a sunny day. Three, his eyes weren’t just green, they were a swirling, intricate, beautiful green that at that moment were the color of sea glass. And four, I was finding it really hard not to close the very short distance between us and kiss the life out of him. _Okay,_ I know that the last one wasn’t really about him, but I mean _come on_. Looking into his eyes while pressed to him and feeling his heartbeat against mine, it was very hard to break away from all of that without kissing him. 

“Oh, um,” I stuttered as I stepped back, “sorry, I must have tripped on something.” I immediately missed the warmth of his arms and the grip he had had around me. He looked extremely embarrassed; hell, his cheeks were bright red and he looked like he was either about to run away or fall over. I wanted to smack Thalia so bad right then. It made it ten times worse when I looked at her and she was staring at us with anticipation.

“Hey Perce—“ a guy from the band walked around the van. “Oh,” he leaned up against the side of the van with a smirk, “well _hellooo_ ladies. (Cue what I think was supposed to be a sexy grin) Come to see the gun show? How’s about we ditch this loser?” Thank the Gods for his inability to read the awkwardness of a situation because he was very effective at breaking us out of the awkward silence.

“Really Leo?” Percy reached back and cuffed him on the back of the head. 

“I’m sorry,” he turned back to us apologetically, “Leo has a problem with talking to girls.” 

“I do not!” Leo looked at Percy with a hurt expression. “Anyways, who are these very lovely ladies?” Thalia and I looked at each other before turning to the boys and doing the double eye roll that we were famous for in high school. Leo stepped back with a look of faked pain that was hard not to laugh at.

“Well then,” Leo huffed, “if they aren’t interested now, then maybe I can convince them later. Percy, how’s about an introduction huh?” Percy looked at me apologetically again before introducing us to him. 

“Annabeth, Thalia, this is Leo. Leo, this is Thalia, my cousin, and Annabeth, my girlfr—” Thalia stifled a chuckle as she looked at her cousin, just waiting to hear the wonderful excuse as to why he had stopped so abruptly. Leo waited patiently, and Percy blushed while simultaneously avoiding my gaze. 

“N-not mine, um,” he stuttered, growing redder by the second, “um, she’s Thalia’s friend… that’s a girl… yeah.” I tried not to giggle at his lame attempt to cover up his slip-up. To be honest, an embarrassed Percy was a very adorable Percy. He was just looking down, scuffing his shoe on the pavement and blushing to hell and back. I probably was just as red as him. 

“Ohhh,” Leo grinned like a madman, “I see…” He locked eyes with Thalia and they looked towards us. They met eyes again and nodded in unison. It was like they had made a pact. What about? I could very certainly guess from the way that their smiles grew as they watched us in all of our uncomfortable glory. 

I looked up, now determined to end this before it could start. I didn’t have time to start a relationship, even if he was _very_ appealing. Like, _really_ appealing, he had these intriguing eyes, and was just a bit taller than me and I just wanted to jump— _Okay Chase, get back on track._ The point was, I was not going to fall into Thalia’s trap justbecause of how much more attractive he seemed to get as I was around him. 

“Wow!” I looked up and smiled enthusiastically. Thalia glared at me, Leo looked on in amusement, and Percy, well, he just looked up in surprise with those entrancing sea-green eyes. 

“Would you look at the time? It’s getting late and I have a paper due on Monday that I should probably finish. I think that I should probably be on my way. I’m sorry. It was nice to meet you!” 

“Yes!” Percy smiled. “Sounds like a great idea! Great to meet you Annabeth. I think I’m going to head home too. Kinda tired, ya know?” He looked at Thalia and yawned dramatically. She looked back and forth between us and glared. Percy seemed to wither a bit under her death stare. Luckily for him, the driver of the van honked and Percy was able to escape. 

“Bye Annabeth,” Percy waved with a smile. “Come on Leo.” He turned and slipped past Leo to get in the van, turning one last time to smile at me before closing the door of the van as it drove away.

As soon as they were gone, I turned around, speed walking towards the street and (most importantly) away from Thalia. 

“Hey!” Thalia ran after me in a way that suggested she was about to tear my head off. “Why? You two are perfect for each other! What was that?” She grabbed my arm and spun me around before I could go any further. 

“I not interested in a relationship right now Thalia.” I bit my lip and looked down. Why was I ashamed? I had nothing to be ashamed about. It wasn’t like he was my _soulmate_ or something ridiculous like that!

“Oh that is complete bullshit and you know it!” She laughed with anger in her tone. 

“You are just too scared to be in a relationship! Just like you were scared to go out tonight. You had fun tonight! What makes you think that this is any different? Just live a little for once in your life Annie!”

“I’m not you Thalia!” I snapped at her, and when her expression seemed to falter for a second I almost felt bad for yelling. My expression hardened again when she glared at me. 

“And you know what? I’m going home.” I turned away from her and started walking towards the street, calling for a cab. 

I didn’t even notice that I was crying until the cabby asked me if I was okay. This night had started out great and last minute had gone sour. 

“I’m fine thanks.” He nodded as I wiped the tears away. 

“You know you kinda remind me of my wife. She had a friend like yours. Complete opposites they were. Fought all the time. Shame that she died. I think I might’ve—“ I tuned him out after that. I wasn’t really in the mood to listen to the old man talk about his misfortunes and decided to look out the window until we arrived.

“Hey kid,” the cabby shook me out of my daze, “we’re here.”

“Oh,” I yawned, “thanks for the ride.” I handed the man his money before walking up the stairs to my apartment. I looked down at my phone and realized that Thalia had called me about five times already. On the sixth call I answered. 

“What do you want?” I cringed after hearing my voice crack. Now she definitely knew that I had been crying. 

“Annie are you okay? I’m sorry that I yelled at you, I just think that you two are perfect for each other. You just haven’t been the same lately and I want you to be happy.” Thalia rushed to say everything at once like she was afraid I’d hang up. She sounded sincere enough.

“Me too, but my happiness shouldn’t concern you Thalia. I know that you are my best friend and you can probably read me like a book, but I promise you that I’m fine. I’m just tired. How about you just call me in the morning and we’ll have lunch or something?” 

“Okay,” she sounded a little deflated, “but you might just have to call me or I might not wake up in time for lunch.” I let out a weak laugh.

“I’ll call you at ten then.”

“Okay Annie. I’ll see you tomorrow.” 

“Goodnight Thalia.”

“Night Annie.”

 

……. 

 

“I’m definitely regretting this whole morning thing right now.” Thalia clutched her coffee to her chest greedily. She looked out the window, squinting at the sun with a scowl. 

“Thalia,” I breathed out a laugh, “it’s past two. It’s not even close to the morning.” 

“Whatever,” she turned to me clearly annoyed. 

“You can go back home if you want to. I have to go finish the blueprints for my paper anyway.” At that she looked a little less grumpy, but I could tell she still was angry at the sun. She nodded at me and blinked slowly like she was already going to fall asleep. 

“Okay,” I smiled, “get some sleep. I’ll see you later.” I slid out of the booth and grabbed my purse. Walking out of the coffee shop I took a deep breath of the city air. It wasn’t the best in the world, but it was home. I headed towards my apartment complex that was a few blocks away. That’s another thing that I liked about the city; everything was incredibly close, making it easy enough to get where you wanted to go without driving. 

In no time, I was in front of the place, Oceanus Apartments. I personally think that when the owner named the place he didn’t even know who Oceanus was. He probably just thought it was a cool name for an apartment complex. 

I bounded up the stairs and pulled my keys out of my purse. Walking to my place, I noticed some boxes in the hallway across from my apartment. I guessed that someone was finally moving into the apartment across from mine. I just hoped that they weren’t too awful. The last tenant, Jack, had be a complete douche. He’d show up at one in the morning obviously drunk and then start singing as loud as possible. He wasn’t very good at singing. It also wasn’t very unusual to hear glass breaking and things crashing in his apartment. Not many people liked him. 

I shrugged, I guess I’d meet them later. Hopefully whoever that was moving in wouldn’t be as awful as Jack. It didn’t really take that long for me to forget about it completely once I had started working. Architecture had been my dream ever since I was five and had traveled to New York for the first time. (I used to live in California) The only problem was (and Thalia teased me about it constantly) that I had a tendency to block everyone and everything out when I worked on it. I guess that’s why I didn’t hear the knocking on the front door.

It took about an hour, but I had finished my paper. I got up and stretched, deciding that I should probably check my mail. I didn’t usually get a lot of mail, but it’d been about a week and it was about time that I did check it. When I opened the door to grab my mail, a little piece of paper dropped to the floor.

 

_Hey! Nice to meet you, sort of. We aren’t really meeting are we? Anyways, I tried knocking, but I guess you aren't home. I’m your new neighbor across the hall and I was wondering if you wanted to come to this stupid little party thing that I’m throwing in a lame attempt to meet people. If you feel like dropping by, I’ll be having people over at like sixish on Thursday. At night of course, I don’t think that even I would show up at six in the morning. I’m rambling aren’t I? Sorry about that. But yeah, I have to go unpack boxes and stuff, so yeah, drop by. Or don’t, I won’t tell you how to live your life. Okay, yeah. Bye!_

 

The note was kind of funny and I snorted out a laugh when I read it. He seemed like a nice guy. The hastily written note was on a piece of torn up paper and I had a feeling that he had ripped up some mail up in order to write his note. _Cute_ , I remarked to myself. I stuck the note in my pocket and walked down the stairs to retrieve my mail. 

 

…….

 

“What do you even bring to a housewarming party?” I held my phone to my ear, waiting for Thalia’s response.

“How should I know? Just get him a plant or something. Maybe something with a fish on it. Or like, something to do with music.”

“Why fish and music?”

“Um… because I think I saw a fish tank and a guitar in his apartment when I came over to your place on Thursday.” It sounded like she just made it up, but I ignored it and went with the fish-music idea anyway.

“Okay,” I walked into the music store, “I think I see something, but you need to tell me if you think it’s a good idea.” I looked over at the selection of guitar picks. They were strange, made out of all kinds of materials.

“I’m listening.”

“Okay, so I’m looking through these guitar picks, and one of them is made out of sea shell; it says on the card under it that it changes the sound, makes it sound ‘warmer.’ Whatever that means.” I looked at the card and turned it over, reading the description.

“That sounds perfect!” She sounded way too excited for it just being a random person that she had never met before, but I didn’t really catch it then because I was so exhausted. 

“Okay,” I yawned and grabbed it, heading to the front to buy it.

“A good choice this is.” He guy at the cash register rang it up and I smiled tiredly.

I payed for the gift and left for home. The guy there had placed the pick in a small black box with a red ribbon around it. It was very nice, mainly because it meant that I could go home and take a nap before heading to the party.

Reaching home, I dragged myself up the stairs and trudged into my apartment. I dropped the gift on the coffee table before flopping onto the couch and nodding off. 

 

……. 

 

“Annabeth,” someone was shaking my shoulder, “wake up. Annabeth, WAKE UP!” I sat bolt upright and smacked my head straight into Thalia’s. 

“What are you doing here Thalia?” I rubbed my head and looked at her tiredly.

“We’re going to the party across the way remember?” 

“Shit.” I stood up quickly and ran to the mirror. Thalia laughed a bit as she followed after me.

“I don’t have anytime to get ready.” I frowned at my messy hair and clothes. “But we’re already an hour late. I guess that I’ll just have to touch up my makeup and go.” 

“You look fine Annie.” Thalia leaned in the doorway as I scrambled to swipe on some mascara. 

“Okay,” I looked in the mirror, “I give up. Come on, let’s just go.” I walked past her into the living room, grabbing the present off of the table and opening the door for Thalia. She slipped out and I shut it behind her. 

By the time that I had locked the door Thalia was already knocking. It looked like she was trying very hard not to smile. Sarah, the girl that lived above me, opened the door with distain. 

“Ugh,” she sneered, “it’s you. What are you doing here?” Thalia looked like she was about to ring her neck.

“I’m sorry,” I glared at her with a polite smile, “is this not the apartment that is directly across from mine, where there is a new tenant that invited us to a house warming party?” She grit her teeth before opening the door and letting us in. There was only about five other people in the living room. I recognized them all, so I guessed that the new guy was probably in the kitchen or in the bathroom. I kind of felt bad for the guy, he had a ton of pizza just laying out, and only five people. Then again, if there had been more people, there might’ve been a cat fight. If you hadn’t noticed, the tenants of Oceanus apartments weren’t very keen on each other. 

Thalia rolled her eyes at the people milling around the room and slumped down on the couch. Following her, I sat down with a sigh. I was beginning to wonder why I had thought that it was good idea to come in the first place. Another thing that I noticed to my embarrassment was that no one else had brought a home warming gift. I was starting to get bored and Thalia seemed to share the same sentiment. 

“Maybe we should leave the gift with a note and head over to my place to watch Netflix.” I looked at Thalia to see if she thought it was a good idea. 

“No!” She looked around a bit as she had gotten a few odd looks from her little outburst. 

“No,” she whispered, “I think we should meet this guy and see if he’s weird or not before we leave.”

“Okay?” I looked at her strangely. Lately she had been acting really weird. I wondered if she had been hiding something from me. She leaned back again and looked at the ceiling like she was completely comfortable and at home. If I didn’t know any better, I would have said that she had been here before, but that was ridiculous. And then suddenly, it wasn’t, because someone came out of the kitchen and can you guess who it was? 

“Are you kidding me right now,” I muttered under my breath as the one and only Percy Jackson sauntered into the room. My life was turning into a romance novel. Great. I was going to kill Thalia. She was doing this on purpose and it was torturous. I wondered how long she had been planning this.

It took him a few minutes to notice us, because as soon as he had shown his face, Sarah had attacked. His slight fear from talking to her was almost enough to make me go and save him, but I wasn’t about to give Thalia that satisfaction. He glanced over towards us and perked up like a dog. He motioned towards us and smiled apologetically at Sarah while she pouted. He basically ran over to us when he had escaped her.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you.” Percy thanked us hurriedly in hushed tones. He plopped down on the floor in front of us with a sigh of relief before looking back up again. 

“So,” he cocked his head to the side, “why are you here? Sorry, that was rude.” I bit back a smile at his apology.

“It’s fine,” I smiled. “So, how’d you find this place?” I asked him in an attempt to avoid his previous question in favor of discovering Thalia’s involvement. 

“Oh,” he smiled, “Thalia helped me find it.” 

“Did she now? How nice of her.” I looked at Thalia with feigned interest while she avoided my gaze. 

“Yeah,” he looked back at me again with that adorable grin. “So, again, why did you come?”

“I got an invitation and decided I’d stop by with a house warming gift.” I handed him the little note that he had placed on my door and his lips formed an ‘o.’ 

“Yeah, it’s funny, Thalia didn’t even tell me it was you.” Something seemed to click in his mind as he looked back and forth between the note and me. 

“So…” He spoke slowly. “You’re the one that lives across the hall from me. That’s cool! We already know each other.”

“Yeah,” I nodded. “Here, have your gift.” I handed him the small box and he held it with great care before tearing off the ribbon like a little kid on christmas. 

“It’s made out of sea shell which is supposed to make your music sound warmer I guess.” I explained to him about the pick as he opened the box and pulled it out to turn it over. 

He stood up quickly and wrapped me in a quick hug before letting go and sitting back down. There was definitely a blush on his face this time, but I ignored it in favor of enjoying his fascination at the gift. 

“I love it,” he smiled, “thanks Annabeth.” I nodded in response and he looked back down at the pick before standing up quickly and walking down the hall. We hadn’t noticed because we had been talking, but everyone, even Sarah, had cleared out of the tiny apartment. I wondered if it had anything to do with the death stare Thalia had been aiming at Sarah earlier.

Percy came back down the hall carrying a guitar that he plugged into a tiny amp that was in the living room. He looked really excited, and checked to see if the guitar was tuned before he grabbed the pick that I had bought him. He strummed a few chords and a beautiful melody swept across the room. He set the guitar down after he had finished his sweet little song and walked over to us with purposeful strides. He picked me up off the couch and squeezed me tight. My heart sped up as I felt my feet leave the ground. It was nice to have his warm arms incircle me and I bit my lip to keep from sighing contentedly. 

“I absolutely love it,” he whispered into my ear before he set me back down on the ground. Looking into his eyes for a second before I sat down heavily, I noticed they were full blown. When I realized that I wanted to kiss him, my walls shot back up and I straightened my back to stand up. 

“I’m really glad that you liked it Percy,” I smiled warmly at him. 

“I’m gonna go home now though. Bye!” And with that, I waved and walked quickly out the door before either of them could stop me and before I could turn back and jump him. I basically ran across the hall into my apartment before closing and locking the door. 

I’m not sure why I was avoiding him so much, I was just going to see him again later, but my mind didn’t care. My mind was also very focused on Percy. The way of how when he was embarrassed he’d reach back and scratch behind his head, pulling up his shirt and exposing a thin strip of skin. The way that his body pressed up to mine and how I was able to feel almost every muscle on his chest despite the multiple layers of clothes we had between us. The smell of the ocean and the sea-green eyes that I had taken to dreaming about in the past week. The way that I felt completely at home in his arms even though I had only met him two times. It was ridiculous, but I felt that if Thalia hadn’t been there I might have just kissed him. Ugh. Why did he have to be so perfect?! It was utterly infuriating. 

Surprisingly, Thalia didn’t chase me across the hall that night. The next day I got a ton of texts from her, but she didn’t confront me that night. It made me wonder if she had finally given up.

Probably not.

 

…….

 

Over the next few months I had seen Percy quite a few times, and we were almost getting comfortable with each other. It was really more me getting comfortable with him though. Percy seemed like he was comfortable with everyone that he met. 

I heard a knock at the door when I was in the middle of a binge watch on Netflix. I had half a mind to just let them knock until they left, but they were knocking quite insistently. I got up and headed to the door while simultaneously grumbling under my breath. They better not care that I was wearing shorts and an old ratty sweatshirt. I was trying to relax and I didn’t feel like impressing anyone. 

‘’Hey Annabeth–” I opened the door and Percy quickly cut off his whatever he was going to say. He seemed to gulp as he looked at me. With a glance to my shoulder I noticed that the shoulder of my sweatshirt had slipped down, but at the moment I didn’t really care. I pulled it back up anyway.

“Yes Percy?” I stared at him tiredly until he snapped out of his daze. 

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I just came to see if you were doing anything right now, because I’m really bored and feel like doing something. Also, I may or may not be locked out of my apartment and it’s getting really boring waiting for the landlord to drive slowly across town. I’m not sure if he’s alive.” He was bouncing on his feet and I wondered if anyone could be that naturally hyper. 

“I don’t really feel like doing anything right now Percy.” He seemed to lose a little bounce with that, but all he did was pout at me. He didn’t stop pouting either until he had decided that I really wasn’t going to do anything.

“Okay then,” he slumped a bit, “I guess I’ll just go back to sitting in the hall.” I sighed as he started to turn around slowly.

“Percy,” I opened the door a little bit more, “I’m not going anywhere right now, but if you want to come inside you can join me in bingeing on Netflix.” He spun around quickly and grinned at my proposition. With a quick nod he moved closer to the door and I opened it wider before turning back to go inside. 

I looked back towards him as I curled up on the couch again and watched as he shut the door. He kicked off his shoes and cautiously walked over towards me, settling on the far side of the couch. 

“So,” he sounded shy, “what are we watching?” I looked at him and he seemed nervous. 

“Right now, I’m watching old Disney movies, but we could watch whatever.” He perked up a bit when he heard Disney. Bizarre. He had a habit of breaking the stereotype that punk guys didn’t like anything Disney or anything brightly colored.

“Do you know if it has Finding Nemo?” He looked to me shyly again as if he was worried that I’d laugh at him. I widened my eyes, but I didn’t laugh.

“I don’t think so,” his shoulders slumped again, “but I think I might have it on DVD.” He perked up again and I almost laughed. 

“If you want to watch it, it’ll probably be over there on that shelf with the others.” Percy immediately got up and headed over to the shelf, searching for the disc enthusiastically. After about a minute of searching he pulled it out from the shelf and held it up to me enthusiastically. I pointed to the DVD player and he immediately traveled over and placed the disc in the slot before plopping back down on the couch again. He seemed a lot more comfortable now that he had found out I had that movie. I silently wondered why he liked it so much and couldn’t help but watch his facial expressions as he watched the movie. Little smiles and frowns and laughs flit across his face in a mosaic that perfectly described him as a person. It was beautiful. 

About halfway through the movie I realized that we had shifted across the couch until our shoulders were brushing. I stiffened for a moment when I noticed, but relaxed as we both laughed at something on the screen. 

The lights in my apartment were low because I had closed the blinds in order to watch the movie without any glare. My eyes started to droop, and it wasn’t long before I had drifted to sleep. 

 

…….

 

A sharp noise woke me up and I flinched before resting my head back down and lazily opening my eyes. I was very warm and felt very secure. It was nice being wrapped up in a nice pair of warm arms– _Wait!_ My eyes snapped open, and I realized that I was lying on Percy and that we were tangled together on the couch. He must have fallen asleep when we were watching the movie just like I did, because the menu screen was on a loop on the television. What the hell?! It was like the Universe had decided that my life was supposed to become a cliché. It was annoying to say the least, because my internal monologue at the moment was almost identical to those of the women that you read of in romance novels. You know, the classic, I felt safe in his arms, it was nice just lying there, blah, blah, blah. 

_If Thalia could see me now._ I had the feeling that she would have been jumping up and down. 

The first thing I did, was to attempt untangling myself and getting out of Percy’s grip. It wasn’t as easy as the books make it out to be. Percy had a vice-like grip, and there was no way that I was gonna end up escaping without waking him up first. It wasn’t like I complaining about the position I was in at the moment, but I didn’t really feel like dealing with the aftermath. So, since the Universe had decided that my life was going to be a cliché, I decided to go along with it for the moment. 

“Percy,” I whispered in his ear, “this is a dream.” He seemed to wake a little at that, and his eyes half-opened sleepily. 

“Percy,” I whispered again, “ open your arms and let me go Percy. I need to go make breakfast for us.” He nodded his head and mumbled something about blue pancakes before letting me go and drifting off again. He was snoring lightly and I think that he was even drooling a little bit. Gods he was cute.

I walked into the kitchen and started washing the dishes until I heard him stumble off the couch. He was pretty adorable with his sleepy face and messy hair. I could imagine him just coming behind me and wrapping his arms around me, resting his chin on my shoulder. I almost wished that he had.

In a panic at seeing his face so suddenly I blurted out the first thing I could think of so that I wouldn’t say anything embarrassing. “You drool in your sleep.” I kept the straightest face that I could, even raising an eyebrow at him. He blushed a bit before replacing it in favor of a cocky grin.

“Been watching me sleep have you?” At that it was my turn to blush, but I quickly threw back a retort.

“I had to make sure you weren’t dead.” He looked at me and scrunched his eyebrows together in confusion.

“Some drunk guy stopped by and knocked on the door quite loudly. He thought my name was Hank and that I was in my forties. I was a little concerned when you didn’t wake up.” A blush spread across his face again and my mind was once again clouded with thoughts of how cute he was when he blushed. It was quite annoying as he had the tendency to blush quite frequently. I wondered if he blushed this much around other people. 

“I’m sorry for falling asleep on your couch.” He looked at me like a little kid that had been forced to apologized by his mother. 

“It’s fine.” I smiled at him, remembering how I had woken up in his arms. Hopefully he didn’t remember that little tidbit. 

“You should come to my next show.” He blurted out the sentence like he had been keeping it in for a long time. 

“It could be fun,” he shrugged looking down, “you could hang out with me and the guys and listen to us play or whatever.” He looked up at me hopefully.

“When is it?” He perked up, excited that I might want to go.

“It’s on Friday night at a bar downtown. I could grab you before and you could come with the guys and me and we could hang out before the set.” 

“Sounds like a plan.” I smiled at his excitement, agreeing to come and purposely avoiding the word date. 

“Alright! Awesome!” He looked like he was about to jump up and down. If it hadn’t been for his hair, I wouldn’t have thought that he’d just woken up.

“I don’t think that the landlord ever came over to unlock your door. I think Thalia has a key if you wanted to stay and watch some more movies. I have the Little Mermaid.” I looked at him and his smile seemed to double in size.

Over the next hour, we sat on the couch enjoying the movie and arguing whether or not Percy looked like Prince Eric. It was fun, and I don’t think I stopped smiling once the entire time. 

_Shit._ I was falling in love with Percy Jackson. 

I was screwed. 

…….

 

“Hey Thalia.” I pressed my phone to my ear before grabbing my laundry and heading downstairs. 

“Sup Annie. I was wondering if you had anything planned tonight.”

“Actually, I do have something planned.”

“What? That sucks, I was going to drag you to a bar and make you listen to music with me.”

“Sorry.” I didn’t really feel all that sorry. I was excited to hang out with Percy and his friends. 

“It’s fine I guess, you’ll just have to owe me. What are you doing tonight anyway?” I bit my lip, wondering how to answer her. I could just tell her the truth, but for some reason I didn’t want to. I wanted this night to be good, and if I told Thalia, she’d probably freak out and try to spy on us. 

“I promised a friend that I’d come see this thing that they were doing. I can’t back out, I’ve had it on my calendar for awhile.” There, perfect, a story that told the truth without revealing to her that I was going to be with Percy. I tossed the rest of my clothes into the washing machine.

“Okay,” she sighed, “go to your stupid thing with your stupid friend. Just know that you will be wishing that you’d taken my deal.”

“Bye Thalia.” I laughed a little.

“See ya! And don’t go around kissing anyone without telling me.” She hung up. I had the nagging feeling that she was talking about Percy.

Speaking of Percy, as soon as I had closed the lid of the washing machine, he bounded down the stairs and into the laundry room. He didn’t notice me. Probably because I was in the back corner and he was transferring his laundry in the very front of the room. I walked over towards him and his abundance of black clothing that was being thrown in the dryer. With the amount he was washing, I wouldn’t doubt it if he hadn’t done the laundry in a month.

“It must be nice having all black clothing.” He jumped a bit before turning around. I didn’t really realize how close we were until he had turned around. He was close enough that if I took a single small step we would have been nose to nose. 

“What?” He looked at me clearly confused.

“All black clothing, you’d never have to worry about separating any of your clothes.” _What the hell was I saying? Was I getting so desperate that I was talking to him about his laundry?_ I felt like Sarah from upstairs. She would cling to _anything_ living that was slightly attractive. 

“I guess…” He still looked pretty confused.

“So,” I decided to change the subject, “are we still on for tonight?” 

“Yeah! Yeah,” he seem like he was in a hurry to reply. “The guys are going to pick us up at around sixish. Is that okay?” He looked a little worried about how I’d answer.

“Yeah,” I smiled, “sounds perfect. I’ll see you then.” 

 

…….

 

I heard a knock at my door at 6:05. _That must be Percy._ I grabbed my stuff and opened the door after hastily checking my reflection. Percy was fidgeting again as he waited for me to open the door. Sometimes, when he would start tapping his fingers restlessly, I wanted to place my hand on his to stop him. I seemed like he was always jittery, but surprisingly I wasn’t that annoyed by it. 

“Sorry Annabeth, but we have to go. Like now. The guys actually showed up on time for once. I think that they were excited to me–“ His words rushed out until he looked at me. His eyes seemed to bulge. I didn’t think that I looked _that_ good. Maybe it was just because he wasn’t used to seeing me in punk gear. 

He seemed frozen in place, so I just grabbed his hand and pulled him down the hall. 

“Didn’t you say that we had to be somewhere?” I looked over my shoulder and he seemed to snap out of his daze when I spoke to him. He nodded and sped up so that we were walking side-by-side. We rushed down the stairs with our hands still locked together until we burst through the front doors where their van was waiting impatiently and occasionally honking. 

Leo opened the side of the van and grinned at us. “Come on love birds, we don’t want to miss sound checks!” We rushed into the van and let go of each other’s hands hoping that Leo hadn’t seen that they were linked. From the cheeky grin on his face, I’m pretty sure that he had noticed. 

“Annabeth, these are the guys. You already know Leo. Jason is the one driving and Nico is the one in the passenger seat.” Jason looked at me in the rearview mirror and winked. Nico just turned slightly and waved. 

“So, is it just you guys on stage tonight?” Percy nodded and Leo replied with a “yup.” Percy’s hair was getting a little floppy and it was starting to annoy me. It didn’t really match his ripped skinny jeans and Sex Pistols t-shirt.

“Hey Leo,” I spoke up, “do you have any hair gel in that tool belt?”

“Yeah, sure.” Percy and Leo both looked at me in confusion when I took the hair gel from him. 

“Percy,” I beckoned, “come here.”

“Okay.” He looked a little confused and nervous. He scooted a little closer to me, but not close enough for what I needed to do. I dragged him closer by his belt loops and turned him to face me. Leo laughed at the expression Percy had made when I dragged him closer to me. 

“Um, Annabeth,” Percy gulped, “what are you doing?” 

“Fixing you.” I grabbed a glob of hair gel and ran it through his hair creating a messy mohawk shape that made me think of early punk bands and vinyl records. 

“That’s better.” I handed Leo back the hair gel and grabbed the cloth that he had offered me to wipe my hands on. Leo and Percy just stared at me in silence.

“What?” I looked at Leo and he just shrugged before taking the cloth back as I held it out. 

Leo attempted to start up a conversation a few times, but quieted down after the third try. All Percy did was watch out the front while glancing at me sideways every few seconds. 

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard the back of the van so quiet before. Annabeth what’s your secret?” Jason laughed a little as we pulled into the alley that I assumed was behind the bar. I heard Percy take a deep breath like he was trying to steady himself. _It’s nice to know that I can distract him so easily. I wonder what would happen if I ran my hand–_ Okay Annabeth, this is not the time. I mentally slapped myself so that I wouldn’t try anything. 

When we stopped, I opened the side of the van and hopped out. I’m pretty sure that I heard Leo slap Percy and tell him to pull it together. About ten seconds later Percy and Leo slid out of the van and went around the back to grab their instruments. 

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Jason looked at me like he was thinking.

“You can hold the door open.” I looked to the door and saw that there was a stopper so that it could stay open without anyone holding it open. I turned back to him and raised my eyebrow. 

“I would let her help if I was you.” Percy poked his head around the side of the van to look at the pair of us. “She’s deceptively strong both physically and in an argument.” I smiled sweetly at Percy before crossing my arms and glaring at Jason. 

“Alright,” Jason quirked an eyebrow, “if you think you can, feel free to help grab the amps.” I smiled at Jason, still slightly annoyed at him. I was so used to people thinking of me as a dumb blonde that I tended to get angry at anyone that underestimated me. 

I walked around the van and Leo pointed me towards the amps. There were a few, all varying in size. I guessed that the bar had some of their own, and these were just the ones that the boys used for specific things. I grabbed the first one I saw (it may or may not have been the biggest and heaviest) and followed Percy into the building to set it on stage before heading back to the van. I know I have an issue with pride, but that wasn’t the reason that I had been insistent on helping. It really looked like they had needed the help, and if they were in a rush for time it was probably a good idea to help. The amp wasn’t even that heavy and I laughed a bit as Leo made a show of lugging his keyboard up onto the stage. 

In no time, the stage was all set up and the boys were ready to go. Jason and Percy were off to the side talking to the owner of the bar. They looked a little angry. Leo walked over and sat down next to me, turning to watch their conversation. 

“You know that he hasn’t shut up about you in the past few months.”

“What?” I whipped my head towards him.

“Percy,” he motioned his head towards him, “he hasn’t stopped talking about you since that first night.”

“He hasn’t?” Leo grinned at my obvious blush and nodded. 

“Are you sure you aren’t dating, because the way he talks about you, I would assume that you are.” If it was possible, I think I blushed harder.

“We aren’t.”

“You sound a little sad about that.” Leo looked at me carefully.

“No,” I smiled. “I don’t even know how I’m feeling right now.” He nodded like he knew what predicament I was in. I had a feeling that he was one of those guys that joked to try to cover up a sucky past. I could understand that. 

Percy kept trying to covertly glance at us when I laughed at the jokes Leo was using to try to cheer me up. Leo kept looking over at Percy too. I think that Leo was trying to get Percy to come over towards us. If it was his goal, he certainly succeeded. 

After their little meeting had concluded, Percy stomped towards us with an expression that looked suspiciously like jealousy. I could tell that something was wrong from the way that he was frowning and clenching his jaw. There was no way that this was just jealousy. 

“Percy, what’s wrong?” I stood up and closed the distance between us, standing in front of him. He looked like he was going to yell at someone.

“What’s wrong?” He scowled as he answered. “What’s wrong is that we might not be able to play tonight.”

“Hey,” I grabbed his hand on impulse, “tell me what happened.” He looked at our hands for a moment before his shoulders slumped and he relaxed a bit. 

“I’m sorry Annabeth. It’s just that I really wanted to play tonight and the sound guy got sick and I…I’m just angry. They called in this other guy Frank, but they aren’t sure if he’ll be able to make it in time.” He sighed before looking into my eyes apologetically like it was his fault that they might not be able to play. He glanced down and played with my fingers while I thought for a moment.

“Percy can you show me the soundboard?” He looked confused at my strange request, but nodded and lead me to it anyway. 

I looked over the board, my hands ghosting over the different knobs and controls. It was very similar to the one I had used in high school for theatre.

“Percy, I think I might be able to work this soundboard.” He looked at me in confusion and waited for an explanation. 

“I used to be a theatre techie in high school. I ran the soundboard for the mics and music. If you want to go up on the stage and try playing something, I can see if I can remember how to work it.”

“Thank you so much Annabeth! I’ll go up and we can test something.” Percy grinned and leaned closer to me before hesitating and stepping away. He backed up, hopping down onto the stage and picking up his guitar. He plugged it into an amp and pulled something out of his pocket. _Was that the pick that I had bought him? It is!_ I smiled to myself quickly.

I turned my focus back to the soundboard and fiddled with a few things before giving him the thumbs up to start playing. He strummed a few chords as I messed a bit with the volume and the guys all looked up in surprise. Percy smiled and started playing a song that I didn’t recognize. The rest of the band got up on stage and added their different components to the song until it was complete. I knew that Jason was singing, but I couldn’t focus on the lyrics because Percy was smiling at me again and I was smiling back and just…ugh. 

I moved away from the soundboard as the guys finished their song, smiling at the joy that had returned to their faces. Jason turned to me in surprise when he saw me climbing down from the sound booth. 

“You? I didn’t know that you could work a soundboard.” Jason sounded shocked. 

“Well,” I replied, “seeing that we haven’t met before and Percy didn’t know, I can’t say I’m surprised.” Leo gawked and Percy smiled at me, clearly proud. 

“I can see that there are quite a few things that I don’t know about you Chase.” Jason laughed a bit before thanking me for being able to help with the sound situation. 

Once the the band had finished warming up, everyone except Percy headed to the bar for a quick drink before the place opened. Percy set down his guitar carefully and unplugged it from the amp. 

I looked after the others contemplating whether or not I wanted to follow them when Percy pulled me into a hug. “I wanted to make sure that they couldn’t see us before I hugged you. If I had before, we would have had to deal with the teasing.” He picked me up off of the ground and I squeezed him back. He held me for a few seconds before setting me back down on the floor and stepping back. We smiled at each other for a moment before leaving the stage and sitting with the rest of the band at the bar. 

 

…….

 

I was having a fun time in the sound booth while the guys played. It was nice being involved without having to deal with all of the crazy people in the crowd. Percy would occasionally look up at the sound booth before looking down again to play. Every time that he would look up, I got a warm fuzzy feeling that spread throughout my body. The feeling that I was in a romance novel came back. 

“Well at least it’s not Percy saving me. That would be even more of a cliché than me saving him.” I muttered the thought to myself under my breath with a small chuckle. 

“Thank all of you guys for coming tonight!” I snapped out of my thoughts when I heard Jason thanking the crowd.

“We’d also like to thank our last minute soundboard wiz. Annabeth can you come down here?” I quickly ran through the catwalk that was above the stage and dropped myself down next to Jason. “Everyone, this is the lovely Annabeth Chase, and without her we wouldn’t have been able to play tonight.” The crowd roared at his statement and I blushed and waved at them shyly. I almost thought that I saw Thalia in the crowd for a moment, but the thought passed as quickly as it had come when Jason was thanking the crowd again and we were all walking off the stage. 

“Annabeth that was awesome!” Leo high fived me before walking towards the backroom to get some water. 

As soon as Percy had gotten offstage and set down his guitar he ran towards me, picking me up and spinning me around. I giggled as he spun me, but soon quieted as he brought me down and looked into my eyes. He moved his hand up and cradled my face before slowly leaning in. We were almost nose to nose and he had turned his head and–

“Annabeth Minerva Chase!” I sighed and moved back from Percy just in time to see Thalia rushing towards me. “Why didn’t you tell me that you were going out with Percy? You told me that you were going out to see a friend perform. You didn’t mention anything about it being him.” For someone that was so set on getting us together, one would have thought that she might have been a bit happier. 

Percy watched Thalia as she ranted. He looked like he was about to push Thalia out of the room for disturbing us. I had half a mind to do the same, but I had learned over the years that the only way you could get Thalia to do anything without complaining was to be calm. It was very difficult to be calm at that moment. I relaxed a bit when Percy found my hand in the dark, but I was still very _very_ annoyed with Thalia and her impeccable timing. 

“I didn’t tell you, because I knew how’d you react.” She opened her mouth to say something to me but I quickly cut her off. “We both know that you would have teased us to no end and I didn’t really feel like dealing with that. I know that you are surprised right now, but I would feel a lot better if we could talk about this later when we’ve both calmed down.” She looked like she was about to protest, but when Percy stepped out of the shadows so she could see him, she shut her mouth.

“Fine,” she grumbled, “we can talk about this later, but I expect full details. Don’t leave anything out, because I _will_ know.” And with that, she turned on her heel and walked out of the room and away from us. 

I turned back around and stepped closer to Percy placing my forehead on his. “I was definitely not expecting her to react so calmly.” He nodded in response and twisted his head so that he could actually kiss me this time. Once again he got close and tilted his head to press his lips to mine and just before he could, Leo called out for us and totally ruined the moment.

“Percy,” he yelled as he bounded up the stairs, “Annabeth, where are you?” I stepped back from Percy with a sigh.

“God dammit Leo!” Percy whipped around and let all of his frustrations out in one short yelled directed at him. Leo stepped back a bit and held up his hands in surrender. 

“Chill dude, chill. I just came to inform you that the van will be departing in T minus sixty seconds.” He backed up to the stairs again grabbing Percy’s guitar before quickly turning and running down them.

“Come on,” I grabbed Percy’s hand and dragged him outside before climbing into the van again.

“First stop,” Jason announced, “the home of our guitarist and soundboard pro.” He pulled out of the alleyway and then we were traveling. Percy kept staring angrily at Leo until I grabbed his hand again and squeezed. His eyes practically begged me to let him hit Leo, but I shook my head no. We would have to get revenge later when he wasn’t expecting it. 

We pulled up to our building and the van stopped to let us out. It sped away as soon as Percy had grabbed his guitar and slammed the door of the van closed. We slowly ambled up the stairs and towards our apartments, attempting to prolong the amount of time before we had to say goodbye to each other. Percy entered his apartment quickly to set his guitar down and told me to wait until he had come back. By the time he had finished putting his guitar away, I had unlocked my door and was waiting for Percy to say goodnight before I slipped inside and fell asleep. 

“Did you have fun tonight?” Percy closed the door of his apartment and looked at me shyly.

“Oh course I had fun. Probably more fun than I’ve had in a long time. Thank you Percy.” He smiled at me and it disappeared when he glanced quickly down to my lips.

“Screw it,” I whispered before grabbing the front of his t-shirt and pulling him towards me. I planted a sound kiss on his lips before stepping back and leaning against my door. I looked down, about to apologize when he rushed forward and kissed me before I could regret kissing him. He grasped the side of my face with one hand and braced himself on the wall with the other. I pressed closer to him and in turn he kissed me harder. I let out a small moan as he parted my lips and our tongues met. Our kiss was desperate and he kissed me like I was water and he had been in a desert. I was melting and it was wonderful. 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, and please leave feedback. See you again soon lovelies!
> 
> AH


End file.
